


frostbitten

by Star_on_a_Staff



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Background Linhardt/Marianne, Blizzards & Snowstorms, Children, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Frostbite, Gen, Hilspar being Parents, Linhardt being Linhardt, Mentions of Minor Injuries, Near Death Experiences, Parent-Child Relationship, Parenthood, Wyverns, kids being kids, light humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:55:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28275678
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Star_on_a_Staff/pseuds/Star_on_a_Staff
Summary: The governess was the first to discover Lisbeth’s absence.At first, she wasn’t very worried. She began with searching in the usual places. The training room of the fortress contained not a trace of brilliant teal pigtails, nor did the storage units housing its winter wares. Lisbeth’s room was untouched, save for a few stray blankets tossed here and there, and only when the governess found the library empty but for a wobbly old monk did she begin to worry.But once she stumbled upon the wyvern stables and found one particular favorite bull of dear Lisbeth missing from its cave, the governess collected her skirts and ran pell-mell to locate Sir Bergliez and Lady Goneril, her sweet wrinkled face whiter than the snow beginning to gather on the grass.In which a Hilspar child loses herself in the snowy mountains of Fodlan's Throat and Hilspar goes appropriately feral with worry. Hilda/Caspar with background Linhardt/Marianne. Post-Canon.
Relationships: Caspar von Bergliez & Linhardt von Hevring, Caspar von Bergliez/Hilda Valentine Goneril, Hilda Valentine Goneril & Linhardt von Hevring
Comments: 4
Kudos: 13





	frostbitten

**Author's Note:**

  * For [roxyryoko](https://archiveofourown.org/users/roxyryoko/gifts).



> Roxy, the captain of the Hilspar ship, commissioned me for 3k words of Hilspar family angst where one of their kids falls into a snow hole. I, the campaigner of angst, was like HELL YES.
> 
> This piece will touch on brief mentions of death, angst, and one f-bomb, but other than that please enjoy!

_in the late winter of the year 1197_

The governess was the first to discover Lisbeth’s absence. 

At first, she wasn’t very worried. The young girl had always delighted in playing hooky from her lessons, especially during the portion of the afternoon when their rotund tutor devoted a good portion of an hour droning on about historical figures such as Viscount Victor the Fifth who established trade routes through the throat of Fodlan, or Madame Moira who rose to political importance after the assassination of her husband at the hands of Brigidan insurrectors. Positively riveting material for an eight-year old. 

“Just tell her the more exciting stories,” the Lady Goneril had said cheerfully when their tutor complained of his students’ short attention spans. “They do so love it when Caspar tells them tales of the battlefield. Fodlan’s had plenty of wars; have your pick of them.”

The tutor clutched his balding head and mourned the future of the Goneril bloodline. 

The governess began with searching in the usual places. The training room of the fortress contained not a trace of brilliant teal pigtails, nor did the storage units housing its winter wares. Lisbeth’s room was untouched, save for a few stray blankets tossed here and there, and only when the governess found the library empty but for a wobbly old monk did she begin to worry. 

But once she stumbled upon the wyvern stables and found one particular favorite bull of dear Lisbeth missing from its cave, the governess collected her skirts and ran pell-mell to locate Sir Bergliez and Lady Goneril, her sweet wrinkled face whiter than the snow beginning to gather on the grass. 

O.O

As the snow bit into her hands and cheeks, unflappable Lisbeth began to regret a lot of things. 

At first the mountain trek seemed like a brilliant idea. One of her favorite bedtime stories that Papa loved telling her and her siblings was of how he once thrashed the monstrous wolves that prowled the mountainside with nothing but his gauntlets and maybe Uncle Holst on his giant ashen wyvern. 

He had given them a practical demonstration with said gauntlets, much to prim Richelle’s dismay and Lisbeth’s delight, and she couldn’t sleep for the rest of the night picturing in her head how Papa would punch the wolves in their nasty foaming jaws, just like in the picture books…

The picture books did not, however, tell her that the mountains were so awfully cold. They didn’t tell her that the trees would be slanted against her, as if all their outstretched hands were grabbing her to push her against the worst of the bitterest winds. 

Her flying tutor also neglected to warn her that dear old Humpfrey would begin snapping and getting stubborn as a boulder after the first ten miles of flight, perching on a pine and whining at her whenever she kicked his sides. 

Lisbeth bit her lip, determined, and dismounted.

That was her first mistake. 

O.O

The lackluster stablehands of the wyvern wings, according to a furious Sir Bergliez, were to be executed by nightfall for dereliction of duty and overall carelessness and blundering uselessness. The order was immediately overruled by his brother-in-law the General, who instead dispatched wyvern search teams to track his missing niece. 

Then there was the matter of Lady Goneril.

“I,” Hilda said in distinct, deadly tones from her perch on a snorting bull wyvern, “will not be cooped up at home while my daughter dies of frostbite out in that blizzardy hellscape.”

General Holst clutched at his hair. “Hilda, we have four search teams out there already. Wouldn’t it be better for you to stay with the children—”

“I’ll make sure they’re taken care of and tucked inside before nightfall,” Marianne interrupted gently before Hilda could fly off her saddle with indignation. “Hilda’s an experienced rider and it would be a waste for her to stay behind.”

The general nodded, his eyebrows drawn together in a stiff line in an uncharacteristically serious manner. “You’ll need a competent healer, but Master Lionel is too old to leave the infirmary in this weather. Do you think--”

“I’ll be accompanying Sir Bergliez.” Linhardt’s deadpan voice was like balm on chafed skin. The scholar was wrapped in enough furs to stave off a century-long winter while Caspar tore out of the fortress with one arm half in his furs and the other dragging his best friend behind him. 

“We’re leaving,” Caspar growled. “Now.”

The stablemaster led Caspar’s black mare and Linhardt’s bay out of their stalls, both horses tossing their heads agitatedly and pawing fiercely at the ground. Caspar mounted hastily while Marianne quickly took Linhardt’s sleeve and slipped him a heavy bottle that flickered with divine magic. 

“Just in case,” Marianne murmured as Linhardt squeezed her hands in thanks. 

They don’t say the words aloud. They had packed all they could as healers; the concoctions, the rags, water in canteens, wooden stakes as splints. There was nothing to do but prepare for the worst and pray for the best.

Hilda’s wyvern trumpeted loudly and took to the skies, its heavy wings beating the air ferociously. Wyverns had noses like bloodhounds, and with a stripe of Lisbeth’s favorite hair tie dangling from Hilda’s outstretched hand, her mount circled once, twice, and then shot off like an arrow towards the southern mountains. 

Both Caspar and Linhardt wheeled their horses around to follow at a canter, accompanied closely by Holst on his boulder-grey wyvern, nearly lost in the growing clouds that had begun to gather in a monstrous stormhead above them all. 

O.O

Lisbeth’s first mistake was dismounting. 

The snow that had surreptitiously led to many pits and hidden holes pockmarked deep across the mountain’s surface gave way under her weight, and with a piercing shriek the little girl tumbled from the pine branches into a deep hole nearly three times her height. 

The sides of the pit were slick with ice and grime. The howling winds outside barely deigned to let any sunlight through the gaping hole she fell through, but Lisbeth shivered and clutched her knees tight as Humpfrey trumpeted mournfully outside the cave entrance. 

“Papa wouldn’t cry,” Lisbeth informed the anxious bull wyvern through the fear choking her throat. “He’d punch this cave until it falls apart. Right, Humpy?”

The wyvern whined lowly and pawed at the cave entrance. Clumps of snow slithered down and gathered at Lisbeth’s ankles. 

“I’ll take that as a yes,” the little girl sighed, curling up around her knees and closing her frostbitten eyes. 

_We’ll imagine something up instead of this dreary cave_. Lisbeth’s thoughts whispered. _Picture it. A nice warm fireplace, the kind that has cherry logs inside and a pretty grate. Hot cocoa, but the kind that Uncle Holst makes, because everyone knows Mama can’t make hers taste as good as his. Papa, one twin on each shoulder, pretending that each one is a deadly Divine Beast and wrestling them into the cushions of their enormous four-poster bed._

“I won’t fall asleep, Papa,” Lisbeth mumbled as the world faded slowly around her, as Humpfrey’s urgent bellowing grew muffled and her body floated like paper boats on the surface of a river. “Promise.”

Below her, the mountain groaned, and water flowed like blood.

O.O

Bitterly cold wind whipped by Hilda’s ears. Cassiopeia had followed Lisbeth’s scent south, towards the thinnest break in Fodlan’s Throat, and the fact that her most rambunctious child hadn’t gotten it into her head to climb the tallest northern peak was a small comfort to Hilda.

A _small_ comfort. 

The first of their troubles arose during midday, when Hilda realized that a winter storm was gathering. The weak sunlight that was peeking through the gathering clouds was beginning to be blotted out, and the shine off of Cassiopeia’s wings had begun to dull. The soldiers beneath them lit their lanterns and crouched in their saddles, grimly continuing to forge onward despite the quickening winds and the steady increase of snowfall beginning to submerge the countryside again. 

Snow erased everything in its existence. The scent would soon be lost. 

Hilda cast a quick glance down past her wyvern’s flanks. Caspar and Linhardt were keeping up at a steady pace below her, followed by a small contingent of Holst’s more elite guard, but they were struggling to maintain their pace as the snow thickened towards the base of the mountains.

The pine forest that clustered below the mountain’s base was thick and made traveling on horseback difficult. Hilda flew in circles for a few agitated moments before Caspar threw his hands up in frustration and began dismounting. 

“We’ll need to go on foot from here,” her husband yelled over the blustering wind to the guards. “Hilda, can you put Linhardt behind you?”

Hilda gestured affirmatively. Cassiopeia whined as she tugged at the reins, and the mournful cry shot straight through her chest. 

“I want to find her too, love,” Hilda whispered to her wyvern, but she tugged on the reins again and the wyvern grudgingly obeyed, circling down to land with a violent upheaval of snow that nearly threatened to blanket her husband’s contingent. 

“I can’t feel any of my fingers,” Linhardt murmured as they began hitching horses in the thicker copses of the forest. “Or my toes. Or even my face.”

“Imagine how Lisbeth’s feeling,” Caspar snapped, violently finishing off the last of his knots with a crunch of leather. He sucked in a deep breath at Linhardt’s silence. “Sorry.”

“I should be the one apologizing, Caspar.” Linhardt sighed. “And you should be behind Hilda, anyway.”

“What are you talking about? You’re our only healer!”

One of the guards spoke up nervously. “Sir Bergliez—”

That was when Lady Goneril completely lost her temper.

“Oh, quit fussing, all of you!” Hilda dismounted from Cassiopeia’s flanks and stormed over to her suddenly wide-eyed husband and his contingent of incompetent forces. “Saints help me, I’m going to find our daughter before the sun goes under that horizon so _listen to me._ ”

“You,” she declared, grabbing him by the collar and pressing their daughter’s hair tie into his calloused hand, “are going to sit in front of me and tell me where to steer. When you see Lisbeth, you will tell me before doing something recklessly foolish like jumping off without so much as a warning. Understood?”

Numb, Caspar nodded.

“And you,” Hilda turned to Linhardt, who had lit up one of his hands and was looking appropriately gaunt under its flickering flame, “put that dreadful thing out. You’re going to sit behind me and be ready to hold on for dear life because Cassiopeia likes to do donuts before she lands. And please…”

Her voice wavered dangerously and she quashed that with a grimace. “Be the first to help my daughter.” 

Linhardt’s eyes met hers, and the gravity in his gaze was more than enough reassurance. “I swear.”

Hilda nodded, her throat tight, and turned to the rest of her brother’s contingent. “You three, follow us. I want the rest of you to set up camp here. If we don’t return to nightfall, you let my brother know.”

The soldiers snapped to smart salutes, and as the men began separating and re-distributing supplies, Hilda stamped a circle around Cassiopeia, rubbing her numb fingers together and grimly vowing to move her entire family south the next time such a blizzard dared to encroach upon their doorstep again. 

Her entire family. Her _entire_ family. _Her entire family_ —

“Hey.” 

Hilda jumped in her boots as Caspar spoke up beside her. “Sothis. Don’t sneak up on me like that!”

“Sorry,” he held up his hands. His eyes were very serious. “You’re wearing out a groove in the snow.”

“It’s fine! I’m fine,” Hilda reassured him in a voice that was a few pitches higher than her usual wont. She sucked in a deep breath. “It’s…I want to find her. Now. Soon.” 

“We will,” Caspar said with a grim, grey-colored confidence as he took her reddened fingers and rubbed them. His face was cast into dark shadow, so unlike his usual cheerful, stupidly recklessness of wont. “And we’re going to do it before the sun goes down.”

“It’s just,” Hilda blurted out, grabbing his gloved hand before he could take it back, “it’s my fault, Caspar. It’s my fault that Lisbeth ran off on her own.”

Caspar stared at her as if she had grown two heads. “Your fault—what do you mean it’s _your_ fault? If anything, it’s on Lisbeth for being too damn reckless for her own good and the stablehands for letting her fly—”

“I was supposed to watch her recitations.” Hilda’s fingers tightened, and there were silver pinpricks gathering at the corners of her eyes. Her breathing was too fast, too hard. “But Marianne was feeling really sick, so I thought I would swing by a little later—I left her _alone,_ Caspar, and she decided to carry off because I left her with that _stuffy_ tutor—”

“Hey, hey, hey.” Caspar rubbed her eyes with the corner of his frost-speckled glove, taking great care not to rub too fiercely into her sensitive skin. “It’s not your fault, babe. It’s not anyone’s fault. Lisbeth just did something really stupid, and we’re to find her and set her straight. Yeah? And we’ll fire that tutor and get someone a lot more interesting.”

Hilda sniffled. “Someone much younger? Maybe Linhardt?”

“I’m not tutoring your hellions even if you pay me my weight in gold,” Linhardt declared firmly from behind Hilda through a mouthful of wyvern hide. Apparently, in her impatience, Cassiopiea had gotten it into her horned head to shove the scholar towards her rider to urge them onwards. “Come on, you two. We’re losing daylight and this beast of yours seems to have picked up a fresh scent.” 

“Oh!” Hilda dashed her tears away with an impatient gesture. “Ugh, you’re right. I’m sorry, let’s go.”

As they clambered on, shouting orders to the three most seasoned guards to follow them on foot, Hilda felt Caspar lean into her arms just a little bit as she took up the reins with a determined air. 

“We’ll comb through the entire mountain if need be.” His voice was dark, grave, urgent. “We’ll find her, Hilda.”

O.O

It was a rare day to see the Goneril fortress in a state of eerie calm. Servants milled in hallways exchanging anxious whispers, and the wyvern patrols circling the ramparts barely called to each other in their usual throaty bellows.

Even the Goneril children were listless, plucking half-heartedly at their toys or fussing over the loss of their parents’ affectionate warmth. The twins had put up a dual howl of loss when they were put to bed without their mother’s nightly kiss, and it had taken the most seasoned of the nursemaids and every one of Marianne’s lullabies to finally send them into a restless sleep. 

Four-year-old Keiran was too shy to cry in front of Auntie Mari, but even he failed to stifle his sobs into his pillow as she stroked his hair and prayed fervently that the Goddess grant them a dreamless night of slumber. 

The oldest Goneril daughter, ten-year-old Richelle, was grave as a judge throughout it all. She kissed Keiran goodnight on his tear-stained cheek and took turns rocking each wailing twin to sleep. But through it all, Marianne recognized the brave front of the eldest child cracking with each hour of her beloved parents and her mischievous little sister’s absence. 

“You should go to bed, darling,” Marianne told her as the clock began to strike ten. “They may be out for a while yet.”

Richelle bit her lip. Her lovely crimped curls, the pride of Hilda’s beauty-loving sensibilities, were unkempt from the constant worrying of her fingers through their strands. 

Her voice was small when she finally spoke up. “Can I stay up a little longer? Just a little bit, please, Auntie Mari.”

Marianne’s heart broke a little further at the sight of the girl’s face: tight, resigned, terrified, lost. It was a pained expression far too old to be on her young features. “Of course, Richelle.” 

O.O

“Lisbeth!”

Groggily, Lisbeth frowned as Keiran kicked her in her ribs. Despite his shy personality, he always had a terribly hard kick, like those mules that would get all uppity when she tried to pet them at the marketplace. “Ugh, Keiran, get away. You’re too old to snuggle.”

Keiran kicked her again. “Lisbeth!”

Lisbeth growled sleepily and turned over. “Seriously, cut it out or I’ll tell Mama.”

“Lisbeth!”

Huh, that was weird. Since when did Keiran’s voice get so deep and scary?

Lisbeth heaved open a frost-bitten eyelid. Papa’s terrified face swam before her cloudy vision, and a warm satisfaction settled over her like a cozy quilt. “Oh, hello Papa…Keiran’s being a nasty butt again.”

His voice broke on a laugh that sounded shaky. How odd. “Lisbeth, talk to me.”

Lisbeth squirmed sleepily. She was beginning to fall asleep. Mean old Humpfrey had kept up such a racket outside, she was only just getting cozy! “Whyyyy.”

“Separate her toes and fingers.” Weird. That was Uncle Linhardt’s voice. He sounded odd too, like she was in trouble and he was trying to figure out how to get her out of it. Why were they all in her bedroom? “Don’t rub them, Hilda. Put these on her.”

Suddenly, pain shot through her entire arm and Lisbeth jerked and cried out. It was like one of the teething twins had bitten her finger with as much might as a one-year-old could muster. 

Her mother’s voice broke through the fog of delirium, panicked and high. “Oh, Lis-baby, I’m so sorry, so sorry—”

“Hand me that—” Uncle Linhardt again, sounding so put out Lisbeth wondered weakly if he was angry. “Caspar, quickly—”

Papa’s voice again. “Ah, fuck—”

“That’s a bad word,” Lisbeth informed him through her haze of seesawing pain and grogginess. “Mama’s going to be mad.”

Papa laughed oddly, and suddenly Lisbeth felt herself being lifted. Something warm clutched her shoulders, and she felt her head bump against a warm chest. There, she heard a heartbeat, fast, like the galloping of horse hooves. 

“I’ll teach you all the bad words I know Lisbeth, just stay awake for me, please—”

Everything was so foggy. So snowy. Distantly, dear old Humpfrey set up a long, lingering howl, joined by a higher pitch that must’ve been Cassiopeia’s voice. Everything was so loud. She just wanted to sleep, for a really long time… 

“Lisbeth?” That was Papa.

“Lisbeth!” That could’ve been Mama. 

“Move, both of you—” Definitely Uncle Linhardt. Something awfully bright flashed, sending dark spots scattering across her vision. 

But by then, Lisbeth couldn’t care, because she had already fallen asleep. 

O.O

The night sky was dark as pitch when the blizzard finally calmed to a heavy snowfall. Deep within the fortress, the General’s aides were pacing restlessly as their lord’s great chair remained empty. The maids clutched their bosoms in fear as knights shifted restless at their posts. The gruff cook clutched his hat and prayed. No one except the infirm could sleep. 

Richelle had finally nodded off around midnight, and Marianne was stroking her frizzled hair into some semblance of order when a sudden trumpet call shattered the stillness of the night. “Open the gates!”

The fortress erupted into chaos as everyone scrambled to meet the shivering search parties at the entrance. The cook roared at his aides to get the fires going as the stablehands caught the reins of a wind-bitten Cassiopeia. The knights had to all but catch Lady Goneril as she tumbled from the saddle, exhausted and pale as a ghost, but in her arms were a tiny bundled form even whiter and stiller than her stumbling mother. 

Sir Bergliez batted off all of the soldiers’ outstretched arms as he steered his wife towards the stairs. “Infirmary, now.”

His men would never forget the way his face looked in the flickering torchlight. It was like he had aged ten years out in the shadow of that forbidding mountain. 

“Is she dead?” A feckless page asked, only to be slapped by Holst’s personal aide. 

Until the sun rose, such things were not to be spoken aloud. 

O.O

When Lisbeth woke again, it was to the warmth of gentle sunlight kissing her cheeks. 

Her limbs felt stiff as boards. Groaning, she attempted to lift her arm, and winced as that pins-and-needles feeling shot through her shoulder like a billion tiny ants. She discovered that moving her other arm and both of her legs elicited the same reaction. Interesting. 

She turned her head. Beside her, Auntie Marianne was sleeping in the infirmary chair next to her pillow. Uncle Linhardt had his head buried in her shoulder. They both looked really tired. 

Lisbeth yawned widely and gingerly touched her tongue. Hey, that’s kind of cool. It was as dry as sandrocks. 

“Lis-baby?”

Her mother’s voice was like balm on chafed skin, and Lisbeth had half-a-second to react before Mama pulled her into her arms with her usual startling strength. “Oh, dear, you’re finally awake.”

“Hi, Mama,” Lisbeth said happily through a mouthful of her mother’s bosom. “I feel all fuzzy. What happened?”

Mama pulled back, her face stern as steel, and shook her finger at her. “Young lady—” 

Uh-oh. That was her ‘Lisbeth’s in Trouble Voice.’ But before Lisbeth could brace for the impact, Auntie Marianne murmured in her sleep, and Hilda quickly lowered her voice again. 

“You scared us out of our minds, Lisbeth.” Mama’s eyes were sharp as nails, and Lisbeth was struck dumb with shock. “You were out for hours before we found you. It was a mercy you thought to bring your uncle’s nasty old wyvern with you, because if he hadn’t been putting up such a racket—”

“I did what Papa did!” Lisbeth said with great energy. “I wanted to kill one of the mountain wolves that he talked about in his story last night!”

Mama let out a long-suffering sigh. “Lis-baby—”

“Lisbeth!”

Papa thundered through the doors of the infirmary with one twin in each arm and Keiran hanging on his left leg for dear life. “ELIZABETH VALENTINA BERGLIEZ—”

“Gently,” Mama scolded, and Lisbeth promptly hid behind her as her father stormed inside, Richelle trailing primly in his wake. His face was _livid_. “You’re grounded for a month—”

“A month?!” Lisbeth screeched in protest as Auntie Marianne moaned and rubbed her eyes from her perch next to her pillow. She immediately slapped a hand over her mouth. “Sorry, Auntie.”

“No worries.” Auntie Marianne wore a beatific smile as she bent over and felt Lisbeth’s forehead. “Good, you’re not feverish. Don’t exert yourself in the name of protesting your imprisonment, dear, you’re still very weak.” 

“I can’t feel my toes,” Lisbeth told her seriously, and both Mama and Papa’s angry faces faded into concern as Linhardt shook his head from beside Auntie Marianne. “You’re going to be bedridden for a good while, Lisbeth, so you’ll need to curb that boundless energy of yours somehow. Go gently on yourself, you looked like a corpse when we found you.”

“Linhardt,” Auntie Marianne scolded, but Lisbeth felt a thick wave of guilt wash over her as a suddenly quiet Papa set down the twins on the bed so that each one crawled to their big sister’s side with huge gummy smiles. 

“Be-be,” Felicity burbled, while Priscilla settled on fondly chewing on Lisbeth’s blanket. 

“You both get some rest,” Lisbeth overheard Mama saying to Uncle Linhardt and Auntie Marianne as she played absently with Felicity’s soft hair and Priscilla’s nightgown. Keiran had wormed his way under the covers to snuggle up beside her, and she didn’t have the heart to kick him out of bed this time as he put his arms around her and hugged her close. 

“Missed you,” he mumbled into her collar, and Lisbeth felt actually sorry as the infirmary door clicked shut behind the healers.

“We’ll save the lecture for when you’re feeling heartier.” Mama eased herself onto her knees beside the bed, passing her pretty white hand through Lisbeth’s hair in the familiar soothing motions all her children had grown to love. “But don’t think that you’re not in trouble, darling. You gave us all a good scare.”

“Don’t leave by yourself again, at least,” Papa told her sternly as Richelle echoed his expression with annoying accuracy. “You put yourself in danger, as well as your mother and Uncle Linhardt. You’ll need to apologize to them when you can, understand?”

“Yes, Papa.” Lisbeth echoed quietly. “But I really didn’t mean to scare you guys. I just wanted to be brave and strong, like you.”

“Brave and strong doesn't mean being foolish,” Papa told her. “What if we couldn't find you in time? You could’ve turned into an ice cube.”

“Ice cube Lisbeth,” Keiran said with a sleepy smile. 

Lisbeth knew that her Papa’s face didn’t get serious often. And he knew that she knew; she could’ve died out there in the mountain, all by herself. 

Dying; the word felt unreal. The only time she saw death up close was when the kitchen cat died, and they had to take him out of the fortress. His body was very still, and when Lisbeth had touched his fur to see what he felt like, her fingers came away cold. 

Uncle Linhardt’s voice flowed through her thoughts again. _You looked like a corpse when we found you._

Lisbeth shuddered. That was an ugly thought. She didn’t want to die. Dying was like sleeping forever. 

And she’d slept enough. 

“I’m sorry for worrying you,” she said aloud, finally, when Mama’s eyebrows had pinched together in worry at verbose Lisbeth’s silence. “I just wanted to be strong like Papa.”

“You can be strong without endangering yourself or others.” Papa said gravely. “I learned that the hard way.”

Lisbeth wanted to hear more about that, but he had gotten quiet and was looking at Mama with that mushy look in his eyes that probably meant they were going to be kissing soon. But Mama just held his hand over the coverlet and smiled at Lisbeth. “Your father’s right.”

“I’ll do better next time,” Lisbeth promised, and they shook their heads with a smile. Not in a deprecating way, but in a “what are we going to do with you” kind of way. Lisbeth had learned this was a good sign. 

“Also,” she brightened as she wriggled into a better sitting position, “Papa said the word “fuck” last night and I want to know what it means.”

Papa turned white as a sheet as Mama’s smile grew sharp as a knife. There was a creak from where she was gripping Papa’s hand. “Whatever are you talking about, Lis-baby? Papa said no such thing last night.”

“What’s ‘fuck’?” Keiran asked curiously. 

Above the riotous clamor that arose from the infirmary, Linhardt held up a single silver strand with an expression of inconsolable woe. “Look, it’s my first grey hair. I’m not even surprised at this point.”

Marianne laughed as she raised a hand to shield her eyes from the rising morning sun. “And it won’t be your last, if they have anything to say about it.”

.

.

.

fin

**Author's Note:**

> lisbeth was on bedrest for like three weeks before going free and wreaking appropriate havoc!
> 
> Some side notes: Richelle is 10, Lisbeth is 8, Keiran is 5, and Priscilla & Felicity are both a year old as of this fic. Marianne is 6 months pregnant during this fic, which was the only reason I didn't have her out with Hilspar plus Linhardt. 
> 
> Also, remember to not rub limbs affected with frostbite, which was Hilda's mistake here. It'll spread to other areas so your best bet is to warm rags with hot water and keep the limbs warm and separated so as not to affect other areas. Also don't listen to me since I'm not a licensed nurse. 
> 
> Thank you for reading, and a special thanks to Roxy for commissioning me with a super neat idea that I've always wanted to write for myself one day! She's also an amazing artist, so go give her some love at [her twitter!](https://twitter.com/roxyryoko)
> 
> And feel free to come bother me on [my twitter!](https://twitter.com/clairvoyancehsu)


End file.
